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Family still reeling years after pregnant woman’s hospital fall

After seven years of anguish, Mary Archer’s family is finally getting some help.

Mary Archer, 38, recently moved into supportive housing seven years after a tragic post-operation incident at St. Michael's hospital that left the Toronto social worker with severe brain damage and forever altered her life and those of her loved ones. (Bernard Weil / Toronto Star) | Order this photo

Mary Archer went into hospital an expectant mother, full of dreams for the future — she came out three and a half years later, severely brain damaged, unable to walk on her own and struggling to speak.

“It’s been like a nightmare that you never wake up from,” says Heather MacDonald-Archer of her daughter’s devastating injuries suffered in the wake of a fall at St. Michael’s hospital in 2009, in the hours after she had surgery to replace a shunt at the back of her skull.

Now, after seven years of anguish, uncertainty over living arrangements, and thousands of dollars in care costs, her family is finally getting some relief — supportive housing for Mary.

Mary Archer, 38, recently moved from an apartment to a non-profit residence for people with physical or cognitive disabilities. Meynell House and a provincially funded agency will cover caregiver costs, lifting much of the current $43,000-a-year financial burden on Mary and her parents.

“We are beyond relieved,” says MacDonald-Archer. She and husband Paul Archer are Mary’s guardians and have struggled to find the 24-hour-care their daughter needs.

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Mary was 23-weeks pregnant when she was admitted to St. Michael’s hospital in April 2009 to replace a shunt after suffering crippling headaches, vomiting and hallucinations. The shunt had been inserted three years earlier after the young social worker was diagnosed with Chiari malformation, a defect in the rear of the skull that blocks the flow of cerebrospinal fluid.

Mary Archer uses a Dynavox to communicate words and phrases to her mother Heather MacDonald-Archer. Mary has short-term memory loss, is unable to walk on her own and struggles to speak as a result of brain damage suffered in a post-operation incident at St. Michael's Hospital.
(Bernard Weil/Toronto Star)

Back in her room after surgery, she was woozy but no longer in pain. Her parents, and Mary’s partner, Bob Crocker, were assured the operation had gone well, though a hospital official later told them they knew even as she was wheeled from the operating room that “the shunt was not optimally placed,” the Archers say.

Just after 10 p.m. that night, alone in her room, Mary tried to get out of bed to go to the washroom, despite having a catheter. She fell and hit her head, according to hospital records. A doctor ordered a CT scan; it revealed slightly swollen ventricles, but nothing extraordinary.

Shortly before midnight, a nurse found Mary not breathing. She had choked on her vomit, the Archers say.

The family prepared for the worst after they said they were told Mary was unlikely to survive and would be kept alive long enough to deliver her baby.

But after 35 days, Mary emerged from her coma, a shadow of her previous self. Her daughter, Isabella, was delivered by C-section at 36 weeks, three months after her fall.

“The result of that evening has left Mary’s life, and ours, in tatters,” the Archers wrote in a 2014 letter to the hospital. “We are exhausted, and devastated as we struggle — still — to put our lives back together.”

Mary Archer is shown with Bob Crocker in August 2008. Their daughter Isabella was born in June 2009, three months after a post-operation incident that left Mary with anoxic brain damage.
(FAMILY PHOTO)

With the help of Mary’s pensions, the Archers have shouldered much of the financial burden resulting from the traumatic series of events. Mary’s cost of care, living expenses and hefty legal bills forced the couple to sell their house by the Scarborough Bluffs and a home they planned to retire to in St. Andrews, N.B., downsizing to a modest apartment. In the first four years, Mary’s physio and speech therapy alone sometimes topped out at $750 a week, they said.

Mary’s care at Meynell House, where she pays a small rent, involves a collaboration between health agencies including the provincial Community Care Access Centre and the March of Dimes, MacDonald-Archer says.

“They’re really making special accommodations for Mary,” who requires a high level of care, her mother says.

While not able to comment on individual cases, Stacey Daub, CEO of CCAC Toronto, said the “amazing resiliency and determination of our clients and their families, helps make the impossible possible.”

The move to Meynell House offers a ray of hope for the family in the wake of a face-to-face apology by St. Michael’s CEO Dr. Robert Howard the Archers say they received at a meeting in March. The apology came without financial compensation, which the Archers say renders it empty.

MacDonald-Archer said St. Mike’s executive vice-president Ella Ferris told them in March “the hospital does have insurance for these types of situations.” But Ferris told the couple in a May 12 letter that because they had previously launched legal proceedings on Mary’s behalf that were discontinued, “the insurance files were closed.”

“HIROC (the Healthcare Insurance Reciprocal of Canada) has confirmed that it is not in a position to re-open a closed claim where there has been a final disposition of the litigation,” Ferris said in the letter. “It is our understanding that a court-approved dismissal, or discontinuance, is considered to be a final disposition of an action.”

“We do appreciate that this is of little to no comfort to you, in light of your current challenges. We would like to support Mary, and your family, but as a public hospital are not in a position to provide direct financial assistance or compensation,” Ferris wrote.

Mary Archer is shown with daughter Isabella in a photo taken last Halloween. Isabella is now a spunky 7-year-old with a "wicked wit," her grandmother says. (FAMILY PHOTO)

The Archers had launched two lawsuits over Mary’s care — one stemming from a pair of falls in 2010 that resulted in stitches and brain bleeding which required surgery. They later dropped the lawsuits. “We ran out of money,” says MacDonald-Archer. In total, Mary suffered five falls at St. Mike’s.

St. Mike’s says it has apologized repeatedly for Mary’s plight, but the hospital has never taken responsibility publicly, the Archers say.

“This is a very sad situation and the hospital has sincerely apologized to the family on several occasions, including in writing from the hospital CEO and chair of the hospital’s board of directors and in person during the Archers’ March 2016 meeting with CEO Dr. Robert Howard and (vice-president) Ella Ferris,” spokesperson Leslie Shepherd told the Star in an email.

“We appreciate that Mary’s family is dealing with significant challenges with respect to her care.”

The hospital declined a request for an interview with Howard or Ferris.

The Archers say Howard told them in March that Mary’s incident was “our darkest hour” and said “we take full responsibility.” A hospital spokesperson would not confirm those statements.

Since Mary’s fall, steps have been taken to prevent similar occurrences. The hospital has initiated more “focused” hourly rounds by nurses at night, when most patient falls occur and introduced post-fall debriefing for staff and a more thorough “electronic documentation record,” board chair Tom O’Neill wrote in a December letter to the Archers.

“...Mary’s journey has had a significant impact and continues to drive us in our improvement efforts,” O’Neill wrote.

For her family, Mary’s brain trauma “still feels as fresh as the day it happened because the tragedy is still there,” MacDonald-Archer wrote in a blog post. The hurt lives on today: “We see it every time we see our daughter.”

Before the incident, Mary was a bright woman with dreams: a social worker who hoped to pursue a master’s degree and go on to teach; an expectant mother shopping for cribs and debating baby names with partner, Bob Crocker.

Today, Mary communicates through smiles, moaning sounds and a special tablet she can use to spell out words and press phrase-buttons.

“I go to get her coffee, but she has no recollection of me being there when I come back,” says Crocker, of Mary’s short-term memory loss. He visits Mary each weekend with their now 7-year-old daughter Isabella — a Shirley Temple lookalike with a “wicked wit,” says MacDonald-Archer.

“I’m still struggling day by day,” Crocker says. “It’s been a devastating situation.”

The tragedy changed all of their lives irrevocably. MacDonald-Archer had planned to spend her golden years writing and teaching, untethered by the deadlines of daily news, her former field (both Heather and Paul worked for decades as editors at the Star). Archer was planning to build their nest egg a little longer as a newspaper editor. Mary’s twin brother, Alastair, who has cerebral palsy, is still missing his “guardian angel.”

Seven years later, the entire family is still reeling.

“It was a seismic event that altered our way of life, tearing us apart and damaging every corner of our lives as parents,” the Archers wrote in a letter to St. Mike’s. “It ruined us in more ways than we can count.”

Watching Mary grow into parenthood was what they had been most looking forward to, MacDonald-Archer says. “She had such a great future ahead of her.”

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